Page:Castaway on the Auckland Isles (IA castawayonauckla01musg).pdf/95

Rh heaviest part of the gale was from midnight until 3, when it hauled to N.W. At 9 it fell instantaneously calm, and continued so twenty-four hours, with dark, gloomy weather and showers.

Sunday, February 5, 1865.—Since I last wrote we have had some very severe weather. We had a rotatory gale, which continued without cessation from the 10th to the 25th of last month, during which time we were reduced to the point of starvation. It was impossible to launch the boat, and, although we traversed the shores as far as we could every day, we were unable to procure anything to eat. It rained heavily nearly all the time during the gale. I never suffered as I do now; it is no use talking about what I have suffered—God alone knows the extent of that since I have been here. I shall talk, or rather write, about something else; but, by-the-by, my hands are so stiff and swollen with hard work that I can scarcely guide my pen, for this is the first day's rest I have had for five weeks.

We have commenced in earnest the work of building a vessel to get away in. This will not prevent me from observing the Sabbath, but during the time mentioned it has been impossible to do so. Two Sundays we were out after grub; the next we were thatching the house; and last Sunday we were working at the wreck, trying to get her higher on the beach, to do which, with the means at my command, I have exhausted my ingenuity without success. We stripped the lower masts and bowsprit, and cut them away: took every ounce of ballast out, and disburthened her of all possible weight, without taking away any of her upper work, as I did not know what I might have done with her had I succeeded in moving her. But this can only be done by lifting her bodily up. I had seventeen empty casks secured round her bows, but they had not the slightest impression on her. She is built of very heavy hard wood, principally greenheart and coppy. She was built from the wreck of a Spanish man-of-war; but I am sorry to say they took care not to put any copper